{"id":35325,"date":"2019-01-16T19:38:41","date_gmt":"2019-01-17T01:38:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.markmallett.com\/blog\/?p=35325"},"modified":"2019-01-16T20:45:57","modified_gmt":"2019-01-17T02:45:57","slug":"the-power-of-jesus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.markmallett.com\/blog\/the-power-of-jesus\/","title":{"rendered":"The Power of Jesus","gt_translate_keys":[{"key":"rendered","format":"text"}]},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Embracing Hope,\u00a0<\/em>by L\u00e9a Mallett<\/span><\/p>\n

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OVER\u00a0<\/b>Christmas, I took time away from this apostolate to make a necessary reset of my heart, scarred and exhausted from a pace of life that has hardly slowed since I began full-time ministry in 2000. But I soon learned that I was more powerless to change things than I’d realized. This led me to a place of near despair as I found myself staring into the abyss between Christ and I, between myself and the needed healing in my heart and family… and all I could do was weep and cry out.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The insecurities of my youth, the tendencies toward co-dependency, the temptation to fear in a world coming apart at the seams, and a storm last summer that facilitated a “shaking” in our lives… all led me to place of feeling utterly broken and paralyzed. Before Christmas, I realized that a gulf had also grown between my wife and me. That somehow, over the past few years, our gears were no longer in sync, and this was quietly grinding away the unity between us.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I realized that I had to spend some time alone to recalibrate years of habits and thinking patterns that had now shaped my personality. That’s when I wrote\u00a0Off Into the Night<\/a>,\u00a0<\/i>packed a bag, and took my first night of retreat in a hotel room in the city.\u00a0But my spiritual director quickly replied saying, “If this is Christ setting you off into the desert, then it will bear much fruit. But if it is your own idea, then it is the wolf encircling and drawing you away from the flock, the end result of which, ‘you\u2019ll get eaten alive’<\/em>…” Those words shook me because the desire to\u00a0run\u00a0<\/em>was so strong. Something, or rather, Someone<\/em> was telling me to “wait.”<\/p>\n

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As for me, I will look to the Lord,\u00a0I will wait for the God of my salvation;\u00a0my God will hear me. (Micah 7:7)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

And so, I waited one more night. Then another. And then another. All the time, the Wolf was circling me, trying to draw me into the desert. It’s only in hindsight that I understand now the difference between\u00a0solitude\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0isolation.\u00a0<\/em>Solitude is a place in the soul, alone with God, where we can hear His voice, dwell in His presence, and let Him heal us. One can be in solitude in the middle of the market place. But isolation is a place of loneliness and despair. It is the place of self-deception where our egos keep us company, stoked by the one who comes as a Wolf in sheep’s clothing.<\/p>\n

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Be still before the Lord; wait for him…I wait for the Lord, my soul waits and I hope for his word.\u00a0(Psalms 37:7, Psalms 130:5)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

I did, and it was there in\u00a0solitude\u00a0<\/i>that Jesus began to speak to my heart. Even now, I am overwhelmed to think\u00a0of it. He was smiling at me the whole time\u2014like the image above that my wife painted for me many years ago. I had, at the same time, begun the Novena of Abandonment <\/em><\/a>that has touched so many of us. The words came alive. I could hear in my heart the voice of the Good Shepherd saying, “Really, I’m going to fix this. I’m going to heal this. You must trust me now… wait… trust… wait… I will act.”\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

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Wait for the Lord, take courage; be stouthearted, wait for the Lord! (Psalms 27:14)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

As the week continued, I put the reins on my compulsive personality and prayed and waited. And day by day, God gave me insights into myself, my marriage, my family, and my past that were like shards of light piercing a deep cavern. With each revelation of truth, I found myself being freed, as it were, from invisible chains.<\/p>\n

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Surely, I wait for the Lord; who bends down to me and hears my cry… (Psalms 40:2)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Indeed, several times, the Holy Spirit led me to renounce and bind what I perceived were certain spirits that had been afflicting me with anxiety, fear, insecurity, anger and so forth. With each pronunciation of the Name of Jesus, I could\u00a0feel\u00a0<\/em>the weight lifting and God’s freedom beginning to fill my soul.[1]<\/sup><\/a>cf. Questions on Deliverance<\/em><\/a><\/span><\/span>